Breviloquium

After what was said about the transmission of original sin, some things are to be said about the origin of actual sin. — Concerning the rise of actual sin, therefore, these things are to be held in summary: that actual sin draws its origin from the free will of each one through suggestion, delight, consent, and action, according to what is said in James 1¹: Each one is tempted, drawn away and allured by his own concupiscence; then concupiscence, when it has conceived, brings forth sin; but sin, when it has been consummated, generates death. — But if suggestion and delight stop short of consent, it is venial sin. — But if consent and action follow in those things which are prohibited by divine law, it is consummated mortal sin. — But if it is done in a middle mode, so that there is consent without action, either because he wills to proceed to action but cannot; then the will is reckoned as the deed, nor is it less culpable than if he were caught in the deed itself; or because he does not will to proceed to action, but wills inwardly to take pleasure in the delight, and then the woman eats, but not the man; and although the sin is not fully consummated, it is nevertheless to be counted among mortal sins, because, with the woman eating, the whole man deserves to be damned; which is to be understood especially in carnal sins².

The reason for understanding the aforesaid is this. Since sin signifies the will’s withdrawal from the first principle, insofar as the will is born to be moved by it, according to it, and on account of it; all sin is an inordination of mind or will, around which virtue and vice naturally arise³. Actual sin therefore is an actual inordination of the will. But this inordination is either so great that it exterminates the order of justice; and in this mode it is called mortal sin, because it is born to take away life⁴, separating it from God, through whom the just soul is vivified; or it is so slight that it does not destroy that order, but perturbs it in something; and then it is called venial sin; because of it we can quickly obtain pardon, because through it grace is not taken away, nor is divine enmity incurred. But the order of justice is that immutable good be preferred to changeable good, honest good to useful good, and the will of God to our own will, and that the judgment of right reason preside over sensuality. And since the law of God commands this order and forbids the opposite, when changeable good is preferred to eternal good, useful good to honest good, our will to the divine will, and sensual appetite to right reason, then mortal sin is committed; of this Ambrose says⁵ that it is “a transgression of divine law and disobedience to heavenly commandments.” But this is committed whether what the divine law commands is omitted or what it prohibits is done; from this arises a twofold genus of sin, namely, omission and commission⁶

But when changeable good is loved more than is due, but is not preferred to the immutable; and utility is not preferred to honesty; and our will is loved more than is due, yet in such a way that it is not preferred to the divine will; and the flesh lusts, yet is not preferred to the judgment of right reason: then it is not mortal, but venial, because, although this is beside the law, it is nevertheless not directly against the law⁷. But sensual appetite is not preferred to right reason except when reason consents to it; and therefore mortal sin is not committed short of consent.

If, however, sensuality is moved inordinately, since that inordination inclines toward evil, although reason does not consent, it is some sin, because it wounds the order of justice in some way. — And because in the state of innocence sensuality was not moved except according to the movement of reason, therefore, while man remained upright, venial sin could not be there. — But now, because sensuality opposes reason, whether we will or not, we must therefore commit some venial sin through first movements; and although these can be resisted particularly and singly, they can in no way all be avoided, because they are sins that are also punishments of sin: and therefore they are deservedly called venial, because by this very fact they are worthy of pardon⁸.

But because reason is not compelled to consent to these things, if after the feeling of delight there is consent to the act, then there is full consent, and thereby consummated sin, because it came even to the man, that is, to the supreme part of reason, on which the fullness of consent depends.

Because there is consent not only to the act, but also to the delight, in which the inferior portion follows sensuality: therefore, if in sensual delight reason succumbs to sensuality, the woman obeys the serpent⁹, and thereby there is a subversion of right order, and thus a subversion of justice; on account of which mortal sin is committed, though less grave, which is imputed not only to the woman, but also to the man, by whom the woman ought to have been checked and restrained, lest she obey the serpent. — And thus it is clear that in the perpetration of every actual sin there is made some imitation of the first sin, according to the explanation of the chief Doctor, namely Augustine, in the twelfth book On the Trinity¹⁰.